Southern Cross begins integration

Southern Cross Media
has appointed
Guy Dobson
head of its newly acquired metropolitan radio division, reporting to chief executive
Rhys Holleran
.

The division covers the former Austereo Group, which Southern Cross bought last month for $770 million. Mr Dobson was chief executive of
Austereo
, which includes stations such as Triple M, 2Day, 3Fox, B105 and SAFM.

Mr Holleran said Mr Dobson and Austereo’s head of content, Craig Bruce, would continue in their existing roles and would soon take on “broader responsibilities", that is, across Southern Cross’s regional radio division. Southern Cross also owns a regional TV network.

“Nothing else will change in the short term, but at some stage we’ll look at how other senior roles across the old Southern Cross and Austereo might need to be adjusted," Mr Holleran told The Australian Financial Review.

Austereo’s executive chairman,
Peter Harvie
, was on the committees Southern Cross had set up to manage the merger of the two companies.

“Peter is a a brilliant person to work with and he’s indicated a willingness to stay on and help us through the integration process, which will take about six months," Mr Holleran said. “I don’t know his plans beyond that."

Mr Holleran and other senior Southern Cross executives spent the week before Easter holding presentations for Austereo staff in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. They also had one-on-one meetings with 40 key Austereo staff, including many of its on-air announcers.

Related Quotes

Company Profile

“Last week was spent going through Austereo’s budgets and getting a better understanding of its financial metrics," Mr Holleran said. “There’s only so much you can learn during a due diligence process."

According to Mr Holleran, the integration committee is “looking at everything from bringing advertising sales departments together to merging payroll systems and creating one email system".

“We’ve done mergers before so we know two things are critical: communication with staff and making sure you don’t bugger up anyone’s pay," he said.

The bidder’s statement Southern Cross released in February said a merger with Austereo would lead to one-off costs of $3.5 million to $5 million during 2010-11 and 2011-12, and generate $12 million to $15 million of “annual synergies and operational improvements" by 2013-14. Mr Holleran said those numbers had not changed.